Walter Wesley Ellebracht III spent his life trying to overcome memories of the horrors that happened in the 1980s at his family’s ‘Texas Slave Ranch.’

Walter Wesley Ellebracht III spent his life trying to overcome memories of the horrors that happened in the 1980s at his family’s ‘Texas Slave Ranch.’

Photo: Courtesy Photo

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Kerr County Sheriff Cliff Greeson inspects a pit where “slaves” cooked their meals. In the background is the barn where the prisoners were chained to bunk beds at night.

Kerr County Sheriff Cliff Greeson inspects a pit where “slaves” cooked their meals. In the background is the barn where the prisoners were chained to bunk beds at night.

Photo: San Antonio Express-News

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Photo: Mike Fisher

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“We used old inner tubes, cedar and gasoline. We used cedar because it burns fast and strong. I knew what I was doing; I had options. But the guy was dead, and there was no bringing him back. I wanted to put it in my past.” — Ranch foreman Carlton Robert Caldwell, who was convicted and sentenced

“We used old inner tubes, cedar and gasoline. We used cedar because it burns fast and strong. I knew what I was doing; I had options. But the guy was dead, and there was no bringing him back. I wanted to put

“It was some of the worst evidence I've ever seen. I totally thought we were screwed. This was the craziest case I've ever had, but these were drifters, and they were seen as less entitled to the benefits than the rest of us are.” — Houston attorney Dan Cogdell, who worked with Richard “Racehorse” Haynes on the defense

“It was some of the worst evidence I've ever seen. I totally thought we were screwed. This was the craziest case I've ever had, but these were drifters, and they were seen as less entitled to the benefits

“He would talk about some of the arguments and fights, but that wasn’t his life. He said that he saw so much bad in the world that he wanted to look for the good.” — Bob Walls, speaking of Ellebracht III, his best friend

A Department of Public Safety trooper walks away from an area where a body reportedly was burned on the Ellebracht ranch.

A Department of Public Safety trooper walks away from an area where a body reportedly was burned on the Ellebracht ranch.

Photo: San Antonio Express-News

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Key chains made at the “Texas Slave Ranch” still hang in a frame on a wall at Bill’s BBQ.

Key chains made at the “Texas Slave Ranch” still hang in a frame on a wall at Bill’s BBQ.

Photo: Bob Owen, San Antonio Express-News

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“He always wanted me to invest in his key chain idea, but I never did. He’d take me on tours, and everybody was smoking, the sawdust was so deep. There were a lot of hitchhikers, but they were never held forcibly. They weren’t slaves.” — Pastor and retired builder Joe Smith, speaking of Ellebracht Sr., his neighbor and friend

“He always wanted me to invest in his key chain idea, but I never did. He’d take me on tours, and everybody was smoking, the sawdust was so deep. There were a lot of hitchhikers, but they were never held

Loraine Haynie, 86, checks on her husband, Jim Haynie, in his home office in Mountain Home. The Haynies were neighbors of the Ellebrachts.

Loraine Haynie, 86, checks on her husband, Jim Haynie, in his home office in Mountain Home. The Haynies were neighbors of the Ellebrachts.

Photo: Bob Owen, San Antonio Express-News

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In the background is Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr. in front to the left is Walter Wesley Ellebracht Jr. in the middle is Richard "Race Horse" Haynes and to the left is Joyce Ellebracht.

In the background is Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr. in front to the left is Walter Wesley Ellebracht Jr. in the middle is Richard "Race Horse" Haynes and to the left is Joyce Ellebracht.

Photo: San Antonio Express-News

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Carlton Robert Caldwell speaks in his home in San Antonio, Thursday, Jan. 31, 2013, about his involvement of conspiracy in 1984, to commit aggravated kidnapping in connection with what has been called "The Texas Slave Ranch" owned by Walter Wesley Ellebracht and his family near Mountain Home, TX.

Carlton Robert Caldwell speaks in his home in San Antonio, Thursday, Jan. 31, 2013, about his involvement of conspiracy in 1984, to commit aggravated kidnapping in connection with what has been called "The

Bob Walls sits on his pickup truck, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, thinking about his friend Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. Ellebracht was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984.

Bob Walls sits on his pickup truck, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, thinking about his friend Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg.

Jim Haynie, a neighbor and friend of Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr, sits in his home office where he runs his water well drilling business. Ellebracht Sr. is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984. Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013,

Jim Haynie, a neighbor and friend of Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr, sits in his home office where he runs his water well drilling business. Ellebracht Sr. is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who

Joe Smith, who oversees Sunset Cemetery in Mountain Home, TX, stands near a landscaped section of the cemetery, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, where a stream runs through which is fed by a spring on what was the Ellebracht Ranch. Part of the ranch is now owned by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department which runs the nearby Heart of the Hills Fisheries Science Center. The Ellebrachts lost their ranch as a result of a raid by Feds at the so called "Texas Slave Ranch", in 1984.

Joe Smith, who oversees Sunset Cemetery in Mountain Home, TX, stands near a landscaped section of the cemetery, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, where a stream runs through which is fed by a spring on what was the

Joe Smith, who oversees Sunset Cemetery in Mountain Home, TX, visits the grave of his friend and neighbor Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr. Ellebracht is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984. Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013,

Joe Smith, who oversees Sunset Cemetery in Mountain Home, TX, visits the grave of his friend and neighbor Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr. Ellebracht is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was

A weathered Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sign hangs on the locked gate, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, that leads to what was the Ellebracht Ranch on Highway 27 in Mountain Home, TX. The state now owns the land that has a constant flowing spring which flows to the Heart of the Hills Fisheries Science Center just to the south. Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, was killed in an automobile accident earlier this month on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984.

A weathered Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sign hangs on the locked gate, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, that leads to what was the Ellebracht Ranch on Highway 27 in Mountain Home, TX. The state now owns the land

Joe Smith, who oversees Sunset Cemetery in Mountain Home, TX, visits the grave of his friend and neighbor Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr. Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013.The senior Ellebracht is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984.

Key chains hand made by alleged slaves of the Ellebracht Ranch hang in a frame on a wall in Bill's BBQ in Ingram, TX, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013. Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984.

Key chains hand made by alleged slaves of the Ellebracht Ranch hang in a frame on a wall in Bill's BBQ in Ingram, TX, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013. Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, was killed in an automobile accident

In a faded photo on the wall of Bill's BBQ in Ingram, TX, Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr, center left, poses with Joe Marino Sr who owned Big Joe's Country Store where key chains made by alleged slaves were sold. Ellebracht Sr is the grandfather of Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, who was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984. Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013

In a faded photo on the wall of Bill's BBQ in Ingram, TX, Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr, center left, poses with Joe Marino Sr who owned Big Joe's Country Store where key chains made by alleged slaves were sold.

In a faded photo on the wall of Bill's BBQ in Ingram, TX, Walter Wesley Ellebracht Sr, center, poses with his son Walter Wesley Ellebracht Jr., left, and Jr's wife Joyce Ellebracht, right. Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, the son of Jr and Joyce, was killed in an automobile accident Jan. 20 on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984. Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013

A weathered Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sign hangs on the locked gate, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, that leads to what was the Ellebracht Ranch on Highway 27 in Mountain Home, TX. The state now owns the land that has a constant flowing spring which flows to the Heart of the Hills Fisheries Science Center just to the south. Walter Wesley Ellebracht III, was killed in an automobile accident earlier this month on Highway 290 just out side Fredericksburg. He was just a young boy when his father and grandfather were arrested and their so-called Texas Slave Ranch was raided in 1984.

A weathered Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sign hangs on the locked gate, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2013, that leads to what was the Ellebracht Ranch on Highway 27 in Mountain Home, TX. The state now owns the land

Attorney Dan Cogdell poses for a portrait in his office Friday, Feb. 1, 2013, in Houston.

Attorney Dan Cogdell poses for a portrait in his office Friday, Feb. 1, 2013, in Houston.

Photo: Brett Coomer, Houston Chronicle

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'Texas Slave Ranch' offspring made the best of life

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FREDERICKSBURG — He was only 9 when the law raided his family's Kerr County homestead in 1984 and their surname, Ellebracht, became synonymous with kidnapping and torture, and their sprawling property given the nickname “Texas Slave Ranch.”

Walter Wesley Ellebracht III watched as his family was arrested and two years later heard the evidence against his father and grandfather — horrifying “torture tapes” of an abducted drifter pleading for his life while being zapped with a cattle prod.

Teased and bullied as a child, “Wes,” as he was known, later would change his last name to try to elude the scandal. But he realized there was no escape, only redemption, and grew to be the man fondly remembered at his recent funeral for his kindness and big heart.

Killed in a car crash at age 38, Wes went to his grave an Ellebracht, one who overcame the nightmares of his childhood.

On a lunch break from cutting wood at a friend's home in Stonewall, Ellebracht III was en route to Fredericksburg on Jan. 20 when he either fell asleep or was distracted by a pit bull in his SUV and veered into oncoming traffic. He died on the spot.

More Information

The Wesley Ellebracht Memorial Fund has been set up at Security State Bank in Fredericksburg to help an 18-year-old daughter who'd been living with him attend college.

To donate, send a check to: PO Box 471, Fredericksburg 78624

The dog, which he'd taken in as a favor to a friend, suffered a broken leg.

“My son was a very caring person, and he did whatever he could to help anyone in need,” said his mother, Joyce Esensee, 59, who was among those initially indicted for the crimes at the ranch. “He couldn't help what his father and grandfather did, but he was never anything like that. Wes was always trying to see the good in people.”

Ellebracht III even tried to see the good in his father and grandfather, who picked up hitchhikers and promised them board in exchange for work.

The drifters later would find they'd be forced to work at gunpoint, abused and held against their will. One worker, Anthony Bates, died after being tortured with the cattle prod.

In 1987, the year after his father, grandfather and the ranch foreman, Carlton Robert Caldwell, were convicted and sentenced, Ellebracht III met Bob Walls, who would become his best friend.

“He would talk about some of the arguments and fights, but that wasn't his life,” Walls said. “He said that he saw so much bad in the world that he wanted to look for the good.”

Torture tales emerge

For years before the raid, Ellebracht Jr., his then-wife Joyce and Ellebracht Sr. peddled carved, wooden key chains to dozens of stores near their 3,500-acre ranch in Mountain Home, about 20 miles northwest of Kerrville.

Ellebracht Sr. aspired to be the “key chain king of the Texas Hill Country,” but lost more than he sold, according to a 1986 newspaper article still displayed on the wall beneath four key chains at Bill's BBQ in Kerrville.

Restaurateur Joe Marino Jr. said his parents bought the Ellebrachts' key chains for a quarter and sold them for 35 cents at their former business, Big Joe's Country Store, for years.

His mother, Sharon Marino, 66, recalls the men always were barefoot and dirty when they came to town.

“You just really didn't want to get up and socialize when they came in; they were scary,” she said.

Everyone knew the Ellebrachts drove a blue van and picked up hitchhikers to staff the key chain factory and do other work at the ranch. But details that emerged after the April 1984 raid, triggered by an escaped worker's call to the Texas Rangers, surprised even the family's closest friends.

Some former neighbors still defend the family, despite the 1986 convictions of Ellebracht Sr., Ellebracht Jr., his only child, and Caldwell for conspiracy to commit aggravated kidnapping and murder for the death of Bates, a one-eyed drifter from Alabama.

“They were strange people, but they're not that kind of people,” said Loraine Haynie, 86, who befriended Ellebracht Sr. as a child and cared for him over the years until his death in 2003.

Ellebracht Sr. had big ideas, but was too lazy to implement them, said Joe Smith, 68, a pastor and retired builder who was a friend and maintains the small cemetery in Mountain Home where he is buried.

“He always wanted me to invest in his key chain idea, but I never did,” Smith said. “He'd take me on tours. ... There were a lot of hitchhikers, but they were never held forcibly. They weren't slaves.”

Caldwell, who now lives in a mobile home on San Antonio's South Side, said that after a fire destroyed the factory, workers chopped wood to be sold in San Antonio.

Caldwell was hired as the foreman, first in the field and then in the main residence, where he worked on Ellebracht Sr.'s latest plan: a tile reprocessing machine that could be operated by blind people.

When he first arrived in January 1984, Caldwell watched in horror as the Ellebrachts used the cattle prod on a handcuffed man who had disrespected a family member. The man groveled in the dirt and begged for mercy, but afterward was allowed to leave, though he decided to stay anyway, Caldwell said.

Not long after, Ellebracht Sr. and Jr. were torturing Bates, with help from the workers, who picked on him because they disliked his temperament and the fact that he couldn't do hard labor after he was injured by a chain saw, according to trial testimony.

“I don't think even (Ellebracht) Jr. knew how much abuse he was going through,” Caldwell said. “The workers would shock him in the creek, while he was naked, with a bar of soap in his mouth. It was a way to take out frustration, but there was no premeditated murder.”

The torture went on for hours at a time, while Bates, handcuffed to a tree with his hands behind him, was zapped repeatedly on his tongue, genitals and empty eye socket with the cattle prod.

The sessions, which were often tape-recorded, weakened Bates, who died that February on the manure-covered floor of the bunkhouse.

Caldwell and another worker built a funeral pyre and, as a cassette tape of Johnny Cash's “Ring of Fire” played, burned Bates' remains. The ashes were scooped into two 55-gallon drums, according to published reports. Bones found at the site were determined to be those of a young adult male.

“We used old inner tubes, cedar and gasoline,” Caldwell said. “We used cedar because it burns fast and strong. I knew what I was doing; I had options. But the guy was dead, and there was no bringing him back.”

Caldwell was no longer needed, and in March, one of the Ellebrachts dropped him off at a truck stop with $20. He hitchhiked to San Antonio and found work at a restaurant, where he saw the raid on TV.

By then, according to court testimony, workers were being held at gunpoint and forced to write their own suicide notes and tie nooses and dig ditches in preparation for their own deaths, or so they were led to believe.

More than a dozen cassette tapes with about 40 hours of recorded torture sessions were seized during the raid, along with guns, machetes, an ax, knives, ropes chains, padlocks, bone fragments, the cattle prod and business papers.

To clear his conscience, Caldwell gave a 20-page statement to the FBI. He later was indicted, along with the Ellebrachts, for his role in Bates' torture and death.

A trial not forgotten

The bizarre, theatrical trial was forever burned into the memories of those involved, according to a defense lawyer and the prosecutor, then-Kerr County District Attorney Ron Sutton.

“They tortured a bunch of people, and it was unbelievable that stuff like that could happen,” Sutton said. “But, on the other hand, the people running up and down the highway were gullible. It expanded my knowledge of humanity, that good and bad can live side by side.”

Nine people were initially indicted: Ellebracht Sr., Ellebracht Jr., Joyce, Caldwell and five ranch workers. Sutton prosecuted Ellebracht Sr. and Jr. and Caldwell, and the workers became state witnesses in exchange for immunity from prosecution. Joyce, who divorced her husband in 1988, would neither testify nor stand trial.

Every day of the widely publicized three-month trial, Sutton said, the 150 courtroom seats were filled with spectators, Wes among them.

Ellebracht key chains were selling at a premium, $2. The jurors compiled their favorite recipes, called it the “Slave Ranch Cookbook,” had it printed at the Kerr County Courthouse and sold copies.

Besides the “torture tapes,” also entered into evidence was one worker's poem, titled “The Shack,” and other recordings of the Ellebrachts putting workers on “trial” in the bunkhouse.

“It was some of the worst evidence I've ever seen,” said attorney Dan Cogdell, 56, of Houston, who worked with the infamous Richard “Racehorse” Haynes to defend Ellebracht Sr. “I totally thought we were screwed. This was the craziest case I've ever had, but these were drifters, and they were seen as less entitled to the benefits than the rest of us are.”

To try to desensitize the seven women and five men on the jury, Haynes played the torture tapes often and asked Cogdell to shock himself with a battery-operated cattle prod like the one the Ellebrachts used.

The off-the-wall tactics worked, Cogdell said, and Ellebracht Sr. was given probation. Ellebracht Jr. was sentenced to 15 years in prison and in 1996 was released on mandatory supervision, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Caldwell also was given a 15-year sentence, but since he'd served nearly three years while awaiting trial, he was released on mandatory supervision in 1988.

By then, much of the Texas Slave Ranch had been sold in pieces to fund the Ellebrachts' defense.

Spring runs through it

The Ellebrachts, descendants of Germans who settled the Hill Country in the 1880s, had inherited land with a robust spring.

The state of Texas obtained rights to it in 1925 and funneled the water through concrete canals to what's now the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife's Heart of the Hills Fisheries Science Center.

In 1990, the state bought 240 acres of the former ranch and the Ellebrachts' home, which has been used as temporary housing for the center's employees, including Bob Betsill, the research program director.

“It's a great house, a one-story renovated rock house,” Betsill said. “There are several other property owners now around us, but there's nobody around from that era. Those stories have been around for years, but people and things have moved on.”

Another piece of the former ranch was awarded to Joann Loftis, Bates' mother, who sued the Ellebrachts for her son's wrongful death.

In the 1989 settlement, she received 43.1 percent — or 1,318 acres, then valued at $1.7 million — and has since sold the property in pieces.

Joyce Esensee and her husband, Art, now live in a mobile home in Fredericksburg. Wes' eldest daughter, Elizabeth Toby Ellebracht, 18, who'd been living with him in Fredericksburg, has moved in with the couple since his death. The Esensees' home is in foreclosure.

Ellebracht Jr. never returned to live in Kerr County, and while at times he had been close with his only child, the two had grown estranged. When asked to help pay for his son's burial, Ellebracht Jr. reportedly told relatives to “let the county worry about it,” his ex-wife said.

“I've separated my life from my ex-husband,” Esensee said. Wes “suffered from what happened up there, and he didn't deserve that, but Wes always tried to live down the past. He wasn't even 10 years old.”

The decision to change his name in hopes of distancing himself from the ranch didn't last long, Walls said.

“He looked at the past and said, 'I'm here now, nobody can change that,'” he said. “He taught me that family isn't really the people that are blood, but those who accept you for who you are.”

Ellebracht III was arrested as a teen, when a group of friends stole beer from a convenience store and broke the window of a car, but was trying to get the record expunged, Walls said.

Always the dependable friend, Ellebracht III was praised by members of the overflow crowd at his funeral. They told stories of how the man who'd managed restaurants, waited tables and worked at odd jobs helped them through complicated situations.

Nine years ago, her son won custody of Elizabeth and embraced single parenting, Esensee said. He was determined to send his daughter to college.

He hadn't seen his second daughter, Alexis Faith Bockemehl, 17, since infancy, but the two girls met at their father's memorial service.

“They're both wonderful girls, and he was a wonderful father,” Esensee said. “I raised him the best I knew how. Everybody says I'm a strong person for what I've been through. I tried to teach him right from wrong.”

emoravec@express-news.net

News Researcher Lauren Brown contributed to this report.

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